


This Won't be the Last

by ErynScarlet



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Attempted Suicide, Darkness, I'm Sorry, Lillian was the worst mom, Other, attempted drowning, because I can only seem to write angst, but what's new, mentions of child abuse, my own spin on a Lena backstory, please don't read if it will trigger you, pre 2x01, trigger warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:28:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26590651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ErynScarlet/pseuds/ErynScarlet
Summary: Lex Luthor Detonates Bombs Across Downtown Metropolis, Killing Thousands.On-screen, a reporter stood, soot covering half her face, one of her arms in a sling, holding a microphone. Behind her, buildings were either on fire, crumbling, or gone. Pieces of the surrounding buildings littered the streets. Chunks of rock and asphalt. Concrete and plaster. The dust settled in the background, people wandering the streets, lost, and confused. Emergency vehicles lining the edge of the frame as the woman continued to speak, listing damages and areas affected by the blasts.
Relationships: Kara Danvers & Lena Luthor
Kudos: 19





	This Won't be the Last

Darkness crept around the edges of her vision, the light from the moon bouncing around the surface of the water as she descended. Farther. And farther. Weighted, but weightless. Staring up at the sky, she watched the distorted stars grow darker. Pressure grew in her chest, painful and sharp, a pounding in her skull as her breath drifted away, small bubbles breaking the surface. A smile crept across her face, the ocean drowning out any and all sounds, leaving a peaceful quiet behind. Everything felt clear. Like she could breathe for the first time. The lasted dredges of her breath escaped, a sigh in the form of bubbles floated away, rising to the surface she was falling so far from. Everything felt heavy, invisible forces pulling at her from all sides. Gravity, pulling her down. Life, pulling her up. Exhaustion, pulling on her soul. Hatred, prodding her heart. Death, consuming her mind. Lazily, she blinked, each time welcoming the blackness. Each time she closed her eyes, she waited longer and longer before opening them again, wondering how long it would take before she couldn’t.

How many minutes can a person survive without oxygen? Science says three minutes. Some people can’t last that long. Some people can go longer. She’s not sure how long it’s been, but it feels like longer than three minutes if her heavy eyelids had anything to say.

How many times would she shut her eyes until it became her last? She lost count at fifteen, exhaustion, and lack of oxygen muddling her thoughts. Closing her eyes, she welcomed the darkness for what part of her wished would be the last time.

* * *

She didn’t have many memories of her mother – her birth mother.

Nights sitting in front of a warm fire, sitting on a woman’s lap. A soft, melodic voice retelling one of many stories. Some about ancient knights and castles. Another about magic, how its power saved the lives of thousands. Most nights, the story didn’t matter to the little girl; being in her mother’s lap was enough. She often found herself drifting to sleep to the sound of her voice, the vibration of the woman’s chest as she spoke, soft and soothing beneath her ear.

Mornings buried under a mountain of pillows and blankets, cocooned in both the covers and her mother’s arms. She would wake up to her head on her mother’s chest, arms wrapped around her small body.

A soft voice would sing to her in the afternoon as she lay in bed, her eyes drifting shut as the melody carved its way into her mind. The words long lost. She had recreated the sound on the piano a few years after being adopted, but it wasn’t the same.

The ghost of a face, shimmering in her dreams. Features hidden by shadows looming in the edges of her vision, the figure blurring to nothingness every time she reached out. Disappearing no matter how much she cried for the woman to stay. To come back. To take the little girl into her arms once more. To tell her everything would be okay. That she wouldn’t go back to that dark, foreboding house where her new mother hated her, and her new brother looked at her with such darkness.

The few things she remembered about her mother she treasured. Much like a chest of gold, she kept the visions, the melodies, the stories, locked, deep inside her heart where nothing could ever taint it.

Anyone that knew the Luthor family could tell you that it wasn’t the best place to grow up in. The mansion, to her four-year-old self, appeared to be the same size as a castle. It’s halls less inviting as the ones in her mother’s stories. It was clear the moments she stepped through the large front doors, that her life would never be the same.

The large front entrance had two large rooms on either side. The one on the right is a living room, the one on the left a dining room. Neither looked inviting, despite the warm fire blazing in the living room, giving the spacious area a warm glow. The man leading her through the house took her to a slightly smaller room than the living room, two people sitting across from each other. The woman turned, coldness in her eyes as they landed on the girl, disdain lacing her voice as she addressed the man beside her. The boy at the table had a similar look in his eyes, though not quite as harsh, when he asked her to play, welcoming her to the family with ice in his voice and hate in his heart.

* * *

The years she spent in that mansion were the worst she could ever imagine. She longed for the days of her mother holding her, rocking her as she cried. She longed for the few years she had, safe from the cruelty of the world, protected by her mother’s strong arms and soft voice. In this place, shedding a tear landed her on the floor, blood dripping from her lip, a cold hand gripping her jaw as a stern voice growled in her ear. _Luthor’s do not cry._ Her new mother would say, the bruising grip she had on the girl’s chin vanishing, her small body dropping to the floor.

One of Lillian’s favorite things to drill into the girl; _children are to be seen and not heard._ She learned quickly to avoid speaking unless someone asked her a question, which didn’t happen often. Family dinners were spent in silence, listening to her new family chatter away as though she didn’t exist. In the beginning, stone-cold glares would be thrown her way whenever she spoke. Over time it turns into Lillian dragging her from the table. Often times she would end up in her room. Other times she would land outside, the door locked after her, stuck in the cold until the moon disappeared and she had to make herself presentable for school.

 _Luthor’s are never afraid._ Lillian said one day through gritted teeth. She had voiced her fear of water after her mother told her she was to be attending swim classes. She tried to get over the fear. She knew people were all over the place, and that they would get her out if anything went wrong. But the sight of the water, people sitting on the bottom of the pool as groups of older kids bet on who could stay under longer; she couldn’t move. Standing a few feet away from the pool, she stood, frozen, terror swimming through her veins, every cell in her body paralyzed. She tried closing her eyes; images of her mother forcing them open. After three consecutive classes of her avoiding getting in the water, Lillian snapped. As soon as she stepped through the front door, a hand wrapped around her wrist, the vise-like grip forcing her to follow the older woman as she was dragged up the stairs. In one of the many bathrooms, a large tub was filled, the massive size making the water quite deep. Before she knew it, she was underwater, the air forced out of her lungs, a sturdy hand holding firm on her chest. The hand on her chest held strong, no matter how much she struggled, arms and legs flailing as she tried to escape. Tried to breathe. It wasn’t until she stopped moving, her eyes falling shut as blackness crept into her vision, that the hand let go. She felt herself being pulled from the tub, her soaked clothes draining all over the floor, soaking into the mat, puddles trailing from the bathroom to her room where a discreet family doctor treated her. 

* * *

Several years later, things hadn’t gotten better. Not that she ever truly thought they would. She still liked to hold that sliver of hope in the back of her mind that someday she would be good enough for Lillian. That the woman wouldn’t belittle everything she did. That she would get praise for something. It turned out not even graduating with the highest marks the school had ever seen was good enough for her. She could only surmise that Lillian was upset that it hadn’t been her golden boy. 

Shortly after her nineteenth birthday found her laying in a hospital bed, a paper-thin gown barely covering her. A scratchy sheet pulled up to her chest, bandaged arms lying beside her, specks of red seeping through the wrappings. A heart monitor beeped slowly beside her, the sun shining through the curtains as it set over Metropolis. The door opened slowly, a tall bald man walking into the room, his blue eyes full of anger and annoyance. Standing at the foot of her bed, she watched as his cold, calculating eyes roamed over her, his gaze landing on her arms. Closing his eyes, she heard him sigh, his brow furrowing angrily before shoving his hands into his pockets. _Luthor’s do not fail Lena._ He’d said, his eyes slowly reopening. _So, either do better next time or don’t do it at all._ He added, tossing a small box at her before turning on his heel, strutting back out of the room, the clicking of the door resounding in her ears.

On the bed by her knees sat a box of pills, a note taped to the inside, Lex’s scratchy handwriting covering the small piece of paper. _We don’t fail. Use these,_ it said. She never did. Instead, the box sat in her desk drawer, moving only when she did, stashed in the bottom of her suitcase as she lugged it out of the house and into the awaiting car. The driver sat in the front seat, waiting for her to finish loading the trunk so he could take her to university, where she would study to become part of the family business, no matter how much she didn’t want to.

* * *

Her time in university was spent studying in the library late into the night, only leaving when the building closed. Until it did, she sat on the floor between shelves, books stacked high on either side of herself, a few open on the floor in front of her as she took notes. Paper after paper, report after report. She pushed herself to get the highest grades she could so that maybe, someday, no matter how unlikely, Lillian would be proud of her. When the building closed, she would stroll through the dark towards her dorm, still working through equations in her head as she walked. Some nights she would stop by the campus café that stayed open until 1 a.m, sitting in a corner booth with a muffin and some coffee, scribbling in her notebook. Other nights, she would go straight back to her dorm, her roommate gone more often than not, leaving her alone in the small, apartment-like space. There, she would change into some pajamas, padding barefoot through the empty space, crashing on the couch with a book, reading until she either passed out or dragged herself to her room.

She spent her first two years that way, taking more classes than any other student. Her third year she had enough credits to be considered a senior, putting her on track to graduate that year, still managing to be top of her class. Though she doubted Lillian would notice, not that she could really bring herself to care anymore. Her third year was when everything changed for her. Halfway through her second semester, she had been leaving her only class for the day, the lecture ending around three in the afternoon. Walking into the campus café, she found her usual corner booth, ordering a muffin and coffee, picking away at it as she scribbled in her notebook. Sitting there for well over two hours, she, along with everyone else in the room, looked up when the television was turned up by the owner, a bright red bar scrolling across the bottom of the screen.

**_Lex Luthor Detonates Bombs Across Downtown Metropolis, Killing Thousands._ **

On screen, a reporter stood, soot covering half her face, one of her arms in a sling, holding a microphone. Behind her, buildings were either on fire, crumbling, or gone. Pieces of the surrounding buildings littered the streets. Chunks of rock and asphalt. Concrete and plaster. The dust settled in the background, people wandering the streets, lost, and confused. Emergency vehicles lining the edge of the frame as the woman continued to speak, listing damages and areas affected by the blasts.

Sitting alone in the corner of the café, she couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t believe her brother, granted not the kindest of people, could actually do something like this. Eyes fixed on the screen, she watched as the camera changed to a man being dragged towards a police car. Even though his bald head was covered in ash and soot, when he looked into the camera, she recognized his eyes. The hate and anger burning brighter as a grin split his face in two. She could see his mouth moving, he was yelling. But she couldn’t hear it. Scrambling, she shoved her notebook and pen back into her bag, throwing a couple of bills on the table without caring about whether or not it was too much, she bolted out of the café. Running across campus, she nearly kicked open the door in her haste to get inside, crashing to the floor in front of the toilet, promptly emptying the contents of her stomach.

The rest of the semester passed in a blur; family lawyers having stopped by a few weeks after Lex’s arrest. Once she graduated, she would take his place as head of the company, the mantle she never wanted to have. She knew Lillian would hate her even more, the older woman’s voice ringing in her head, praising her brother, doing nothing to hide her hatred for the adopted girl. She spent even more time than before hiding in the back of the library or her dorm room, doing whatever she could to stay out of sight, her only interaction with other people being in class when she handed in her assignments before bolting out the door.

Graduation came and went, but she avoided the ceremony. Between packing to move and the looks of fear and hate, she’d been getting from her classmates; she had no desire to go. Instead, she threw her meager belongings in the trunk of a car she bought with the money she got from her father’s death and left campus. Crossing the city, she pulled up outside LuthorCorp, the towering building radiating darkness.

* * *

Standing in her office, she watched the previous days Venture launch with a glass of dark liquid in her hand, turning when she heard the large wooden doors open.

“Ms. Luthor,” her assistant said as she took a hesitant step into the room.

Turning fully, she gestured for the woman to continue, sighing when the taller brunette informed her a pair of reporters were waiting outside to talk to her.

“Send them in please,” the CEO said, swallowing the rest of the amber liquid quickly before depositing the empty glass on the drink cart.

“Good morning, Ms. Luthor,” A tall gentleman said, his left hand fiddling with his glasses as he walked in the room, a slightly shorter blonde behind him.

“Mr. Kent,” Lena greeted. “I assume you’re here to ask me about the launch,” she prompted.

“Straight to the point as always,” the man chuckled. “I heard you were to be a part of the launch?” he asked.

“There’s a perfectly reasonable explanation for why I wasn’t aboard the Venture yesterday,” the CEO said, rounding her desk.

“I had some details to iron out of a ceremony I’m holding tomorrow. I’m renaming my family’s company,” she said as she sat behind her desk. Picking up a pen, she flipped open the first folder in front of her.

“That’s lucky,” Clark said, adjusting the strap across his chest.

“Lucky is Superman saving the day,” Lena said, skimming the first line of the document.

“Not something one would expect a Luthor to say.” The reporter mentioned.

“Supergirl was there too,” the blonde woman spoke timidly, half-stepping out from behind Clark.

“And who might you be?” Lena asked, taking in the shy-looking woman.

“Uh, I’m uh, Kara. Kara Danvers. I’m with CatCo,” Kara stuttered, her gaze falling to the floor.

“Not a publication that's known for hard-hitting journalism,” Lena commented, smirking when a dusting of red crawled up the blonde’s neck.

“She’s with me,” Clark cut in, pulling his notepad out of his bag.

“Can we speed this interview along?” Lena sighed. “ask me what you want to ask me. Did I have anything to do with the explosion.”

“Did you?” He asked.

“You wouldn’t be asking if my last name was Smith,” the CEO quipped.

“But it’s not. It’s Luthor,” the reporter said; his voice hardening.

She knew it would happen. The judgmental voice as they spoke her last name with malice. She wasn’t surprised when newspapers all over the city jumped at the chance to blame the new Luthor in town. She just hadn’t expected the same reaction from an old friend of her brothers.

“It wasn’t always,” She sighed. “I was adopted when I was four,” she said, turning her chair away from the duo.

She remembers the few times Clark would come to the mansion after school with Lex when they were in high school. She remembers watching them work on a science project, Lex jokingly berating the younger boy when he didn’t understand what to do.

An almost unnoticeable look of surprise crossed the reporters face, Lena watching as a mix of sympathy and sorrow flashed in meek blue eyes behind the taller man.

“A subsidiary of my company created the part that exploded,” Lena said, pushing the memories aside as she stood. Crossing her office, she stopped in front of a stack of flash drives.

“This drive holds all the data I have on the oscillator,” she said, handing the small device to Clark. “I hope this helps your investigation.”

“Thank you,” the reporter said.

“I’m here for a fresh start, please let me have one,” Lena said, cringing internally at the slight pleading tone.

“Good day, Ms. Luthor,” Clark said, turning to leave.

“Uh, good day,” the blonde said, pushing her glasses farther up her nose as she moved to follow Clark.

“I hope this isn’t the last time we talk?” Lena said, shifting back behind her desk.

Turning with a smile, the blonde nodded.

“I hope not either.”

Smiling, she thought back to all the times she hoped for things. Each time her childlike mind felt less and less dejected when nothing changed.

But maybe – just maybe – this one time, her hopes could come true.


End file.
